Is the country ready to welcome Mel Gibson back from his self-imposed screen hiatus?
The actor, dogged by alcoholism and that infamous anti-Semitic rant, gets his first starring role in seven-plus years with “Edge of Darkness.”
The film casts Gibson as a Boston detective trying to solve the murder of his own daughter.
The material isn’t unfamiliar to Gibson – cops, guns and a grab bag of steely stares. But will audiences embrace him with the same enthusiasm they once did?
WWTW caught “Darkness” Tuesday night, and I’ll be posting my review on Friday. I strained to hear the conversations of fellow movie goers as we exited the theater.
One woman said, “he always makes good movies,” while another woman spoke in agreement – obviously two satisfied customers. Yet another cracked the actor must have shot the film between rehab stints.
Ouch.
Americans are a forgiving lot, and other actors have battled similar demons and came roaring back to the A-list.
Consider Robert Downey, Jr. as Exhibit A.
So if people think “Edge of Darkness” is vintage Gibson material there’s a good chance they’ll forgive and forget his past transgressions.
(Photo: Mel Gibson plays a detective out to solve the mystery of his daughter’s murder in “Edge of Darkness.”/Warner Bros.)
Related posts:
on 
on 
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I think forgiveness is tied to how likeable the public finds them to begin with and what their offense is. Are a celeb’s demons purely self-destructive like Downey or ones that lash out at others like Gibson?
As far as acting goes I don’t seen Gibson attending his prior status, how much of that has to do with his personal demons, his time away from acting or simply the fact that he’s old, probably a combination of all three.
Opus … well put. And Gibson’s age will likely play a factor in his comeback. One nasty critic over at rottentomatoes.com mentioned the actor’s thinning hair in his comments. Nice.
I wonder if Gibson has moved to the path of apathetic acting. He was likeable in his big movies cuz he was hyper and engaging, but “payback” was right back to mad max. Nothing expressive.
As for his failings, I think they are relatively mild in my opinion. (don’t get me wrong there is more to say) His dad is an anti-semite, but I think it’s against religious jews rather than all of the “race” of jews, because of his devout catholic background. That is still bad, but my point is, he was raised in a world where the WORST thing you can call someone is a jew. And he was drunk, and he wasn’t happy.
I’ve said some absolutely VILE things in my life while drunk and not happy, but something I find kinda odd, is that my insults follow two paths, because those two things are the worse things you can say to someone of any status, not just those who are “historically” associated with that group. The only goal was to share displeasure through insult, and you reach for the worst insult you can find.
I think that is what Gibson did, if he has some latent anti-semitism, probably but his jew tirade is more likely being raised believing that the worst thing you can do is call someone a jew. Not an excuse, but reason enough to allow me to forgive him enough to watch his movies.
Douglas, I always felt Gibson was a movie star in the best sense … a box office draw who could legitimately act. He’s a fine director, too, witness his directorial debut “The Man Without a Face” and subsequent offerings.
As for his sins … his comments were ugly, no doubt, but they seem far more forgivable than, say, drugging and raping a teenage girl.